


Half-portion

by vanerz



Category: Inazuma Eleven, Inazuma Eleven: Ares no Tenbin
Genre: Don’t copy to another site, Gen, Sushi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-12 12:44:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18446810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanerz/pseuds/vanerz
Summary: Right after the euphoric high of the Zeus match and the horrific crash of Seishou versus Outei Tsukinomiya, Mansaku, Asuto, and Kirina go for their regular after-match meal. Originally written for the 'Soccer Yaroze' zine.





	Half-portion

Right after the euphoric high of the Zeus match and the horrific crash of Seishou versus Outei Tsukinomiya, Mansaku, Asuto, and Kirina went for their regular after-match meal.

This time was Mansaku’s turn to choose the restaurant. It was a sushi train restaurant, not a proper one like he'd grown up in, with the sushi chef being the boss and apprentices who got up at 5am every day to prepare the rice, but it would have to do. It had been too long since he'd had sushi. He wouldn't be picky about quality.

Well. Asuto and Kirina would still say that he was. But there was no way a son of a sushi chef would willingly eat at a 100-yen sushi joint. Also, the plus side of going to a slightly more expensive place was that they didn't have to line up as much. But Mansaku didn’t have much appetite any more, not after witnessing what Outei Tsukinomiya had done to Seishou.

None of them spoke beyond answering the restaurant staff's questions until they were shown to their seats. Kirina immediately grabbed a plate of sea bream _nigiri_ , and within the next minute Asuto zeroed in on a plate of octopus and grabbed it as well. He looked back at Mansaku, who hadn't moved an inch. The quirk to Asuto’s eyebrows was all Mansaku needed to understand his unspoken question.

“It just doesn't look as good,” Mansaku said. “The rice is all flat, and the fish isn't as thick as Pop slices it.”

“This tastes pretty good,” Asuto offered while chewing his octopus. And chewing… and chewing… and chewing. “It's great with the soy sauce.”

“There’s no way your octopus should be that chewy.” Mansaku knew that his upbringing had made his tastes more particular, but really, this was too much. “Besides, octopus goes best with _ponzu_.”

Asuto shrugged, to Mansaku’s complete lack of surprise. He had always been a sushi heathen, even back on the island. It was good to know some things wouldn’t change. Kirina chuckled, maybe thinking the same thing, and Mansaku let his frown ease into a smile. Within a minute all three of them were laughing together.

They were ignoring the elephant in the room. Outei Tsukinomiya had brutalised Seishou. How could they face off against that?

\---

Asuto and Kirina were both on their second plate when Mansaku finally saw it.

“There,” he said, pointing at a green, mid-range plate holding _akami_ tuna _nigiri_. “That's the best-looking one of the lot.”

His friends were moving before he even finished his sentence. One cleared space on the table and the other grabbed the plate and plonked it in front of Mansaku.

“Look,” Kirina said, and his calm voice mollified the protest that was bubbling up from within Mansaku, “you're here, you might as well have some sushi.”

Mansaku gave the _akami_ a full visual inspection. The fish was of a decent size, and it wasn’t the bright red that would have been a clear sign of chemical manipulation. He picked a piece up with his fingers and detected no acrid aroma from overly vinegared rice. Deftly, Mansaku flipped it over so that the fish was on the bottom, dipped the fish into a bit of soy sauce, tipped the entire thing into his mouth, and chewed.

“Well?” Asuto demanded.

Mansaku swallowed, and the expression on his face smoothed out.

“It’s fine,” he said. “Not as good as Pop’s.”

“Obviously!” Asuto replied immediately, and even if he wouldn’t trust Asuto’s sushi taste buds as far as he could throw them, Mansaku was touched that his support of Manpei was so unconditional.

Kirina, on the other hand, was as hard to read as ever. “You miss him, huh?” he finally said, and Mansaku bit down the instinctive ‘No!’ that rose up from within him. He had been raised not to tell lies.

“I mean, it seemed like you two never really got along, growing up on the island,” Kirina added.

Heat rushed into the tips of Mansaku’s ears, and he shrugged. “No, we did,” he said, trying to keep the defensiveness out of his tone. “I should’ve been nicer though.”

“You’re not the only one,” Kirina continued. “I miss my grandma too. We exchange letters. She’s not too good with texting and stuff.” His lips parted open into a rare grin. “She said the entire village loved our interview. Wonder what your father thought of your mega closeup?”

“Oh.” Mansaku didn’t want to relive that embarrassing experience for as long as he lived, but the way Kirina’s grin twitched told him his friend knew exactly what he was doing. Sometimes he was worse than Asuto. “I should call him.”

“You should.” It was Asuto, and the faint smile on his face as he said it made Mansaku feel like the worst person on the planet. How could he have been so insensitive? The bubble that had been housing the gradually warming atmosphere surrounding them popped, and Mansaku panicked. He should have remembered about Mrs. Inamori. It hadn’t been that long ago. Even Kirina had the decency to look abashed.

“Sorry, Asuto,” and Mansaku was painfully aware of how stilted he sounded, “I didn’t mean to–”

“It’s fine!” Asuto’s smile stretched from one side of his face to the other, and funnily enough, it didn’t look like he was faking it at all. The customary fire in his eyes was burning brighter than Mansaku had ever seen it. Maybe their victory over Zeus had cheered him up, but personally, it hadn’t motivated Mansaku _this_ much. Had something else happened?

“I want to tell you guys something.” In his excitement, Asuto tapped his empty plate with his chopsticks and looked them both in the eye. Mansaku exchanged a curious look with Kirina and settled into his seat, his second piece of _akami_ forgotten.

“Remember when Yone-san called me in from the balcony that night? It was to give me a letter. From my mum.”

Mansaku remembered that, or rather, he remembered the weird rumours floating among the team for the few days after that. Whoever started it had bad taste.

“What did she say?” Kirina asked.

“Oh… things like telling me to study hard!” Asuto forced a laugh, and for the first time that day, his expression closed a little. That was understandable. Mansaku didn’t push it.

“You know. Just things she wanted to say to me.” Asuto’s voice was quieter now, and Mansaku’s heart twinged in sympathy.

Then the corners of Asuto’s mouth tugged upwards. He really was like a freakin’ _daruma_. No matter how hard you pushed, he’d always bounce back up again.

“And she told me one thing. My dad’s not dead. He’s alive! And,” Asuto chuckled as Mansaku’s jaw dropped open, “somewhere out there, overseas, he’s a pro player. Mum said that if I keep playing soccer, I might meet him one day.”

“That’s great,” Mansaku hastened to say. His head was reeling. And for Asuto, it must have been an even bigger shock, to suddenly have your dead and alive parents the other way around, but of course he would never say that out loud.

“That’s cool,” Kirina said, still in that unflappable tone. Only from his broad smile could you tell what he was really thinking. “So that’s why you’ve been more fired up lately. I thought there was a special reason.”

“Yeah. Maybe Dad is following the Football Frontier. Or maybe he only follows the Inter-High, or the J-League. Either way, I just have to keep playing soccer. Soccer’s not going anywhere, and I’m gonna use it to find him. And when I do, I’m going to tell him all about Mum, and about Inakuni island, and everything he missed when he was overseas.”

The determination in Asuto’s voice was infectious. Against his will, Mansaku felt his heart start to race. He wanted to be back on the soccer pitch again.

“I guess we all just want to make our family proud!” Asuto gave them both a knowing smile, and if his gaze lingered a bit longer on Mansaku, well, Mansaku wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing that he’d noticed. “Right?”

“Yes,” Kirina said firmly.

“For sure,” Mansaku added. He could admit that much. Otherwise, what was the point of leaving the island? You can get anywhere with persistence. They’d gone from having their island team disbanded to playing in the Football Frontier Nationals. How much further could they go?

“Let’s make a pledge to play the best soccer we can, okay?” Asuto said. He put one hand out on the table in front of them, palm face down, and suddenly Mansaku remembered he had another piece of the disappointingly not terrible _akami_ left. Wresting his gaze from it, he put one hand over Asuto’s, and Kirina put his hand over theirs.

“To the Football Frontier finals,” Kirina said, his placid azure gaze sharpening into a piercing glint.

“To the finals!” Asuto proclaimed, the fire in his eyes blazing white-hot, bright as the midday sun.

“To the finals,” Mansaku declared, and as he looked back at the piece of _akami_ , he felt that they were no longer a faraway dream.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was originally part of the 'Soccer Yaroze' zine that was unfortunately cancelled. Thank you to Noon and Clem for betaing it <3
> 
> I know the thing about the akami might seem a little weird initially, but I think Mansaku's internal conflict about it mirrors, in a way, what I imagine his feelings about country vs. city, and sushi vs. soccer, and 'You can get anywhere with persistence' (one of his quotes from the match in Ares where he used his hissatsu for the first time!) would be.
> 
> The wonderful ending art was done by @namocchiart on Twitter! It was originally meant to accompany the fic in the zine.


End file.
